From the Archives
Man as a Geological Agent: An Account of His Actions on Inanimate Nature, by Robert Lionel Sherlock, 1922
Progress in Physical Geography 2018, Vol. 42(4) 530–534 ª The Author(s) 2018 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/0309133318787999 journals.sagepub.com/home/ppg
David R Butler Texas State University, USA
Abstract Interest in the Anthropocene has risen dramatically and has been the subject of discussion in this journal. Decades prior to the current interest in the Anthropocene, the British geologist Robert Lionel Sherlock published his book Man as a Geological Agent: An Account of His Actions on Inanimate Nature (1922). In that book, Sherlock described the massive amount of sediment displaced in Great Britain up to the year 1914, and concluded that the human agency of surface modification of the Earth exceeded many times the natural processes of surface denudation. With the recent explosion of interest in the Anthropocene, Sherlock’s book has been “rediscovered” and is being frequently cited in the Anthropocene literature. Keywords Anthropocene, Robert Lionel Sherlock, Great Britain, denudation
I Introduction In a recent paper in this journal, Ellis (2017) called upon physical geographers to engage in the research on and discussions of the Anthropocene. I applaud his efforts to energize the readers of this journal to do so. I also believe it is important to recognize classic efforts to illustrate the importance of humans as agents of landscape change. Early examples mentioned by Ellis (2017) included George Perkins Marsh’s classic Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action (1865), and Thomas’ massive edited volume Man’s Role in Changing the Face of the Earth (1956). In the intervening period between those works mentioned by Ellis (2017), a major English-language book was published that specifically addressed the role of humans as
geomorphological/geological agents – Robert Lionel Sherlock’s Man as a Geological Agent: An Account of His Actions on Inanimate Nature (1922). Although the term “Anthropocene” was still many decades in the future, Sherlock’s book provides a vivid account of the widespread role of humans as geomorphological agents in Great Britain at a point in time in the first quarter of the 20th century. This book, a somewhat forgotten tome, perhaps because of its rather dense prose and somewhat repetitive presentation style, is nonetheless deserving of a closer look in this “From the Archives” piece. Corresponding author: David R Butler, Texas State University, San Marcos, TX 78666, USA. Email:
[email protected]
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III Man as a geological agent
Figure 1. Robert Lionel Sherlock, from an undated photograph of the staff members of the British Geological Survey, Photograph P810107. Reproduced by permission of the British Geological Survey. CP18/004.
II Robert Lionel Sherlock Robert Lionel Sherlock (DSc, ARCS, Fellow of the Geological Society) (Figure 1) was born on 26 August 1875, and died 18 January 1948 (British Geological Survey, 2017). He joined the British Geological Survey in 1903 directly upon completing his schooling at the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, and rose to Senior Geologist in 1922 (British Geological Survey, 2017; Cooper, 2016). He was an expert in the study of strategic evaporitic minerals (rock salt, brine, gypsum, and anhydrite), and wrote or co-authored several regional geologies of locations across England (Cooper, 2016). Through his travels across Great Britain and his studies of mineral deposits, Sherlock was exposed to the widespread alteration of the British countryside resulting from mining and a wide range of other human constructional and excavational activities. This interest culminated in his 1922 volume, Man as a Geological Agent.
Sherlock’s book begins with a four-page Foreword by Arthur Smith Woodward, who was at the time the world’s leading expert on fossil fish as well as the renowned Keeper of the Department of Geology at the British Museum (Natural History) (Watson, 1944). Woodward’s foreword begins by noting the many forms of surface alteration produced by animals, touching upon the discipline of what would today be referred to as Zoogeomorphology (Butler, 1995). Woodward invokes burrows and holes dug by animals, as well as the activities of beavers, as ways by which animals alter the Earth’s surface. He uses these activities as a basis of comparison for how humans have affected the surface of the planet, describing how humans learned to use tools and soon thereafter began surface alterations of the Earth. He briefly describes some of the forms of surface alteration to be discussed in the book by Sherlock, and interestingly concludes with the question as to whether “prodigious combustion of coal and other carbonaceous substances, in producing more carbonic acid that can be eliminated by ordinary natural processes”, may lead to “an unwelcome change in his atmospheric surroundings” (Woodward, 1922: 7–8). Sherlock begins his text with an Introduction that could in many ways serve as a jumping-off point for discussion in many a seminar class, by stating his belief that the line between physical geography and geology is not easy to define and, indeed, may not exist. He places his volume in the context of the geomorphology of the time, invoking both Davis and Penck, and notes that he was unable to discover “any comprehensive account of the effect of Man on geographical or geological conditions” (Sherlock, 1922: 14). He then sets the stage for the remainder of the book by noting that his work is primarily restricted, because of the size of the task, to the area of Great Britain. He also notes that the data he subsequently discusses in the remainder of
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Table 1. Chapter topics in Sherlock’s book. Chapter number
Chapter title
I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII IX. X.
Introduction Denudation: excavation Denudation: attrition Subsidence London Accumulation Alterations of the sea-coast The circulation of water Climate and scenery Conclusions
the book is restricted to the time frame leading up to and stopping with the onset of “the Great War” – that is, World War I. The introduction concludes with a description of the topics of the chapters to come, and with thanks and acknowledgments. The subsequent chapters cover the topics as shown in Table 1. Chapters II through VIII (Table 1) provide descriptions of the variety of ways humans have altered the landscape of Great Britain up to 1914, with data presented on the amount of material mined or quarried; total subsidence; excavations and accumulations in the city of London; quantity of brickwork construction; slag- and waste-heaps; alterations of the sea coast by erosion, dredging, and reclamation; and land drainage, irrigation, and waterways. Data sources for these volumetric estimates are discussed by Sherlock, with his comments as to the accuracy/veracity of the volumes presented where appropriate. The chapter (Chapter II) on Denudation: Excavation is one of the strongest chapters in the book, supported by data on the amount of subsurface mining of coal, iron, tin, copper, lead, gypsum, rock salt, and several other ores, rocks, and minerals. The chapter additionally documents the amount of material removed from open-air quarries for items including (a partial list only) gravel and sand, clay, sandstone, slate, and “iron-stone”. The total amount of materials excavated in Great Britain,
from roughly 1500 CE to 1914 (the start of the Great War), is astonishing – 19,692,000,000 cubic yards (15,055,614,263 m3) from mines, 15,500,000,000 cubic yards (11,850,600,298 m3; obviously these data are general, rounded figures) from quarries and pits, over 3,000,000,000 cubic yards (2,293,664,573 m3) associated with railway excavations, and additional large values resulting from excavations for the Manchester Ship Canal, other canals, roadcuttings, excavation of docks and harbors, and building and street excavations. The “grand total” amounts to 39,709,000,000 cubic yards (30,359,708,855 m3) of excavated material, as detailed on page 86 of Sherlock’s (1922) book. The chapter on London provides some of the most interesting data on the sheer quantity of alterations to the natural landscape over a relatively small geographic area. Topics discussed include a description of the original site of London prior to massive alterations, followed by descriptions of the amount of “made-ground”, wells and boreholes, sewers, underground railways and passages, the Thames and embankments along the river, solutional activity, masonry, and the bulk of brickwork in London. The volumetric data presented are impressive, to say the least. As only one example, Sherlock calculates that the total excavation for all the London tube-railways (as distinct from the Metropolitan and District Railways) in existence in 1914, when the total length was 41.6 miles (66.9 km), amounts to 7,143,000 cubic yards (5,461,215 m3), of which 3, 300,000 cubic yards (2,523,031 m3) is the extra quantity allowed for stations, passages and shafts. (Sherlock, 1922: 167)
The extent of the “honeycombing” of the subsurface beneath London is something which is taken for granted today (Figure 2), but the values are staggering. Chapter X, Conclusions, is the tour de force of Sherlock’s work, where he brings together all the quantitative data from the previous chapters to derive the overall impact of humans on the
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Figure 2. Sign indicating the entrance to the London Underground (“the Tube”) adjacent to the worldrenowned Tower of London, portions of which are visible at center left. Photograph taken by author on 23 May 2012 (all the figures in color are available online).
landscape of Great Britain. Sherlock states that the total excavation in the country was on the order of 40,000 million cubic yards [30, 500 million m3] of rock, which if taken uniformly from the surface of the British Isles would be equivalent to the removal of a layer 3.83 inches [0.097 m] in thickness. Omitting Ireland, from which a small but unknown amount additional to the 40,000 million cubic yards [30,582 million m3] has been excavated, the layer would be 5.24 inches [0.13 m]. (Sherlock, 1922: 330)
Sherlock notes, however, that little excavation by humans had occurred north of the Firths of Forth and Clyde in Scotland, so by excluding that portion of Scotland north of the Firths, the material removed “is equivalent to a layer of rock 7.12 inches [0.18 m] in thickness” (Sherlock, 1922: 331). Sherlock goes on to compare the amount and rate of erosion produced by humans with “natural” geomorphic forces of denudation, particularly stream
denudation. He concludes that “in a densely developed country like England, Man is many times more powerful, as an agent of denudation, than all the atmospheric denuding forces combined” (Sherlock, 1922: 333).
IV The rediscovery of Sherlock’s book Sherlock’s book was published in a period when little attention was being given to environmental concerns produced by human activity. His work has, however, recently become much more broadly appreciated. Of 63 citations of Sherlock’s book on Google Scholar, all but seven of the 63 citations of the book post-date the year 2000 (as accessed on April 20, 2018). It is clear that the development of the concept of the Anthropocene in the past decade has also accelerated interest in Sherlock’s book. Modern-day visitors to Great Britain likely give little thought to how substantially the
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surface and subsurface of the terrain they visit was altered during the Industrial Revolution and into the early 20th century. London’s Underground rail system (the “Tube”) whisks millions of visitors and locals per year across the metropolitan area, but how many of those passengers give any thought to the massive area-wide excavation necessary for completion of the system, or the altered terrain under which they are passing when in transit (Figure 2)? How many people wonder what the pre-Industrial Revolution of Great Britain looked like before the removal of the vast quantities of coal and other mineral deposits? Sherlock’s book provides a valuable record of just how vast the changes to that country’s landscape have been. Sherlock himself stated, “‘Man strews the earth with ruin.’ But this conclusion is too flattering to human vanity. Man’s most permanent memorial is a rubbishheap, and even that is doomed to be obliterated” (1922: 343). The Anthropocene, indeed! Declaration of conflicting interests The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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